No sugarcoating the effects of lockdown
In a tough time for hospitality, a Waikato cafe owner is adding another cafe – in the Bay of Plenty – to her offering.
Sugar Bowl Cafe owner Megan Taylor bought Moxi Cafe at Ō hope Beach, with the help of family, and hopes the risk will pay off.
Waikato has had three weeks of lockdown after two Covid-19 cases were found in the community, and by yesterday case numbers in the latest outbreak had reached 83.
Sugar Bowl Cafe has two Hamilton locations, and owner Megan Taylor said surviving lockdown had been tough and hospitality businesses were feeling the impact.
She had always wanted a cafe at Ō hope and was excited about the new opportunity with Moxi Cafe.
Taylor said support from the community was helping hospitality businesses keep their doors open but the longer lockdown continued, the harder it got.
‘‘Support local. At the end of the day, if you don’t have those local businesses, communities become fractured.
‘‘I am so grateful to our regulars who have kept us afloat during these tough times.’’
Before lockdown the cafe was bustling, Taylor said, and she was trying everything she could to try to get people in.
‘‘The challenge is, people want a dining experience. They want to be able to sit and chat and meet their friends and dine.’’
And people were understandably nervous. Taylor hoped vaccination rates would help people feel safe once lockdown was lifted.
For Taylor, the lack of certainty was the hardest part of surviving lockdown.
The inability to plan and reassure staff was difficult.
‘‘The Government is not giving us certainty around dates, so you are living from news announcement to news announcement.
‘‘You can’t even plan to open. We don’t have an end game.’’
She said there would be a new normal eventually but business in level 2 was still hard. ‘‘I am hopeful things will go back to normal but we are all living on the edge until then.’’
Lockdown was extremely hard on businesses and, in many cases, local support was the only thing keeping them open, Hospitality New Zealand chief executive Julie White said.
‘‘Weekly reviews leave so much uncertainty and there are many sleepless nights ahead.
‘‘Every day businesses cannot trade at anything close to normal is a day closer to them shutting their doors for good. That means family businesses and jobs lost.’’